Fallout: Progress
by DenManPH
Summary: The courier is pulled from his world to find himself in a new one, now what does he have to offer it? how will he get home? and what does it have to offer him?
1. Burying the dead

**American Wasteland**

 **Date: 2527 May 27**

 **Location: Somewhere in the Northern-Commonwealth**

 **Alexander**

Hero, murderer, salvation, demon, son of a bitch, warrior, peacemaker, wanderer, courier. I've been called many things. Many less dramatic than those listed, and far more offensive. I've fought, and killed, and died. Once for being in the wrong place at the wrong time, carrying the wrong thing, another for seeking vengeance that wasn't mine to seek. Two men, one put a bullet in my head, another a stake through my hands, both buried me, and twice someone dug me up.

I don't know why I chased them, didn't have a good reason to. Curiosity I suppose; to see where it all went.

I've all the titles I've carried, wander is most fit, I've been all over the American wasteland, met many different people, many of which were wanderers like yours truly.

"I'm gonna split your face!" Ah, the warm welcome of some raider punk looking to make a few caps, interrupting my thoughts.

I leaped behind the rubble of a once massive monument, a testament to the old world's technological prowess. But now it's something to stop lead. I peek from my cover to see the entrepreneur of this bloody surviving business, a kid. Maybe 18 at the oldest. At Least 15 years younger than me. What was that old world saying? Youths wasted on the young. Maybe. Or maybe experience is wasted on the old. In any case. No amount of youth or experience stops bullets. With a disturbingly satisfying thump that I only recently realized was disturbing, his body his the earth. Half a dozen holes in his chest from the old relic in my hands. Peeking about looking for any allies. And finding none. He was alone.

I've picked up a bad habit in my old age. I started burying the ones I killed. Never realized how busy I got until I felt the pains in my arms from the hours of labor. Damn foolish and I know it. But I'm doing it all the same. "Getting to soft for this shit"

Also doing that thing that Joshua suggested. Prayer. Don't know who I'm praying to, or why I'm praying for some drugged up punk barely big enough to lift the golf club he tried to end me with. If my old unit in talon company could seem me now they'd laugh their asses off before they tried gunning me down. But as drugged up as he was, as stupid as he was. All I see is a dead boy

.

A few hours later I have a shallow grave. I check him for what gear I can take off him, I'm not too far gone as not to check a body yet. Mostly empty canisters for some cocktail of drugs. And needle of psycho. Used to pawn that stuff off. Burn it now. Also had some cigs. Still, smoke them. Outa stop, makes me cough. But it stops my hands from shaking.

In any case. It's too late to keep traveling. Sundown. And the rubble makes for decent shelter.

Shuffling steps. Whoever it is they can't sneak worth a shit. Listening closer for a moment. Metal hitting the concrete and earth, do they have metal soles? Idiots. Must be raiders. I slowly wrap a hand around my rifle before springing up. Raiders alright. The gaunt bodies and metal paddings are a dead give away, so he did have friends. They're surprised by the sudden move, disorganized. Three I can see in front of me. Who knows how many around me, I pull hard on the trigger. Full auto. I cut down two before the final one with a sawed-off shotgun blast at me. It's poorly aimed, but it's a sawed off shotgun. Hard to miss with that. Armor catches most of it. But I don't wear leg armor, It chaffs. Damn buckshot rips through my thigh. I punish her for it, though. Empty the damn clip into her. Bloody mess when I'm done. Then I hear the shouts from outside. And the crack of a rifle and whiz of a bullet as it passes over my head. The next moment I'm on the ground and rolling to an outcropping of still standing wall and blind firing around the corner where the rifle crack came from. "Frag out" son of a bitch they have a grenade!

as the little explosive pineapple lands next to me and it flashes before me, I lunge to get out of the blast radius and off it goes, only to produce nothing but an ever growing ball of static-like electricity, a pulse grenade. Also know as 'fuck you' to robots, power armor, various other systems. Of which I'm none of the above.

But the damage is done they've used this time to push up. I level the rifle on my hip and fire at the right corner while drawing the big mountain transponder in my off hand and reaching for the trigger that'll get me the hell outa here. But not before one of them runs around the corner. He gets a couple 5.56 rounds in him for his trouble. But not before he drops a round into my torso from an old hunting rifle, I don't have a moment before I pull the trigger on the transponder and a flash of agonizing blue light I'm gone.

I stir from unconsciousness sprawled on the ground, looking up to see a metallic ceiling, reminding me of a brotherhood base or two. A rather uncommon sight, More so after using the big MT , gone is the odd bluegrass and dome of Big MT. I begin to move before a sudden biting pain reminds me that there's a .308 in my chest, and buckshot in my leg. Tensing I begin to pull my riot gear off to survey the wound.

God damn holes massive, looks like someone shot me with a golf ball, hell with the shit those drug tribes call weapons maybe they did.

as I look about for my backpack. It's then when I see the pool of blood forming around me, and feel a sudden light-headedness as the adrenaline wears off, refocusing I realize my pack is out of arm's reach. Reaching for my emergency stash in my boot, a single stimpack, and a buffout. The stim goes into my leg. And I down buffout dry.

I hate this stuff, addictive. Dangerous. "But if I pass out I'm dead."

I need something to put me back on my feet, then I remember I'm carrying a syringe of psycho, "never got a chance to burn it" as if the buffout wasn't bad enough. But I can barely move my legs, and my torso feels like it's on fire."God damn that hurts"

Pulling myself to my feet and lurching as the pain intensifies, and finally deciding to jab myself with the psycho. this shits terrible. Straight up kills you and gives you the shortest temper imaginable. But knocks out pain like nothing else. "hell, here goes.."


	2. The Magellan

UNSC Carrier Magellan

Date: 2531 May 27

Location: Main Bridge, Exiting slipstream.

Captain Beck

A slight tremblin echoes down the ship as it exists its slipstream.

My coffee starts rumblin in the mug "hell was that? Mr. Galahad, report."

The ships AI's holo-image appears "Unknown Captain Beck, running diagnostics"

Just what I need, more complications. As if having ONI operatives up my ass n' squirmin weren't bad enough, that doubled with babysittin this nowhere planet. I get why we're here, Insurrectionist presence is high and there's been a lot of propaganda lately, that the whole covenant war is a sham to get everyone under the UNSC's heel. People'll believe anything but the truth it seems.

Galahands holo-image comes back up, the appearance of an early 13th-century knight donning the well known great helm but otherwise colored a light see through blue.

"Captain, we have a problem"

"What is'it"

"The Shaw-Fujikawa Engine is nonresponsive."

"That the shudderin we felt?"

"Yes, sir."

"Now, what the hell just happened?"

"Unknown, sir."

reeling, the engines down. that means we can't leave. Not until we can send a signal to have us towed out of here, as far as I knew there weren't any shipyards on the planet below. And even if there is it would be dangerous with the insurrectionist presence planetside, they'd love to get their grubby little hands on a carrier.

"Also sir. There appears to be some kind of commotion in the lower decks"

"Why you tellin me this"

"One of the individuals involved is unknown"

"A stowdaway? Did they hurt the engine?"

"I'm afraid I don't know"

Alexander

Moving as quickly as I could while my rage began to bubble over, reaching my pack I started to sift through it for my medkit.

Pulling a stimpack quickly I switched to inspecting my wound, a hand straying to my back to check for an exit wound. "fuck, lucky" yeah, I got 'lucky'. There was one, not good for blood loss but it means I won't have to go in with tweezers trying to pull it the damn bullet. Jabbing the stimpack into my back below the region, and then going to search for another for my front.

Damn wasteful using three stimpacks, but I need to know where the hell I am. Now that I didn't deserve the pain after wasting hours burying that kid, "you're getting soft Alex"

Nearly got me killed, and it got me here. Whoever here is.

After resting for a moment and letting the pain ebb away and the stimpacks do their work I began digging into the pack yet again, this time for my plasma defender, my sidearm.

Donning my armor once more I began to look around and take stock of my situation, I appeared to be in a supply closet of sorts. And after mulling it over for a moment I decide to check through the door and leveling my plasma defender ahead of me. "Plasma defender" an old enclave version of the plasma pistol, or at least I think they made it. They're the only ones that seem to have em.

Finally, opening the door and peering out.

UNSC Carrier Magellan

Captain Beck

"play the recording"

"Yes Captain beck"

"This is uh, Lance-Corporal Duran and my report. I awoke from cryo at around o six hundred standard times, I started to go about undressing from the cryo body suit. Nearly everyone takes a shower after cryo, anyway. The cleaning personnel was a bit later than usual, not that I could blame them. Cryo tends to make the weaker stomached marines lose it. Right, sorry. So I'm undressing and then I hear what, at the time. I thought to be covenant weaponry, so I grab my sidearm from the locker and MD6 and rush where I heard the sound from. I turn the corner and there's some guy with a weird armor and a weirder gun holding up the navy personnel, he saw me and switched his weapons aim to me. A standoff pursued during which he questioned my undressed state, it was quickly ended when he was jumped by the personnel he was previously holding hostages. He proceeded to throw his attacked off him, displaying incredible strength. About then is when I emptied half my side arm into him."

"play the next one Galahand."

"Yes sir"

"This is Doctor Richard's report on the patient, he has suffered six 12.7x40 rounds to the chest. Rounds made contact with the body armor the patient was wearing and shattered portions of it, shattered fragments lodged into the skin but stopped the all but one slug from making its way inside. It hit above his pelvis, barely missing it. Lucky bastard, it seems the armor where the bullet struck was recently grazed by some of the same buckshot in his leg, weakening it. The shot fired by Lance-Corporal Duran managed to strike an old bullet fired from an unknown individual before the confrontation, maybe even years before. The patient shows oddly dense skin and regenerative capabilities faster than the average human. And likely be dead without them. The patient is 167.13 centimeters tall and 112 pounds, he appears to be suffering from malnutrition. I've inserted a feeding tube. I've pulled Lance-Corporal Duran's slug out, as well as the buckshot and unknown slug. I an x-ray as well, and. Well all respect sir, but what the fuck happened to this guy? They're roughly thirteen slugs stretched across his body as well as unknown other objects, his heart. His heart Has been replaced with artificial replacement. And his spine, my god. They replaced his spine with a prosthetic, it's insane. It shouldn't be possible to pull out a spine and then totally replace it, his body is covered in scars, head included. Most appear to be from firearms, but some are clearly from blades weapons or blunt force trauma, and a few appear to be scorch marks. Some are reminiscent of covenant plasma weaponry. Now this is where it gets really weird. His parietal lobe has a chunk cut out of it, and a scar across his frontal lobe. There are also some odd foreign objects, four in total. The same I found elsewhere in his body, clearly, they were put in on purpose, there are nine others across his body. What they do I can only speculate at"

"What is he? Some kind of insurrection super soldier? I doubt it, he wasn't all that super, not If Lance-Corporal Duran had such an easy time putting him down. He's not spartan that's for sure"

"Sir, they're about to start"

"right then, let's see what you are."

I look back to the view screen to watch the interrogation. They managed to have restrained him after he held up some cleaning personnel, this whole thing made zero sense, an insurrectionist comes aboard, fucks our engines like their old lovers, holds janitors up at gun point and the noise attracts a recently thawed corporal and his fire team. That wouldn't be too bad on its own, but the fucking gun! And the rest of his gear, it's downright alien. But not covenant, hell besides the pistol most of its useless, or redundant. Especially the computer on his arm, it's OLD tech, like 600-year-old tech. His rifle was an old ak-47, and when I say old I mean it. Its stock had been replaced with a shovel grip that looked older than the rest of the gun, and the barrel, holy shit. It was piping.

His armor was a joke as well, not as bad as the rifle mind. But we hadn't used stuff like that since 22nd century. That and how he looked, small. Underfed. Like one of those glassed survivors, just borderin on being anorexic.

The look in his eyes too, he moved like he was waiting for someone to jump him. Understandable I suppose.

He looked like he'd that had been a prisoner of war. But neither the covies nor innies take prisoners, and we don't abuse ours. Well, maybe if oni gets them. Which I guess they just got this guy.

"So, who are you?"

He looked around before answering her, for a moment he stared directly into the camera, givin me chills. Still looking at it, he replied "Alexander" almost absentmindedly.

"how did you get aboard this ship alexander?"

"This is a ship? Huh, doesn't feel like it. No rocking."

Is he being sarcastic? He sounds serious.

"You realize you aboard a spacecraft, do you not?"

He turned to her, his eyes squinting before smiling lightly "almost had me for a minute"

What the hell is he talking about?

"you don't believe me?"

"your men shot me."

"You pulled a gun on navy officers."

"sorry about that, psycho gives you a short temper," he said with a smile, he opened fire on a naval vessel and brushed it off like it was no big deal.

"yes, we're well aware of a drug in your system. What we don't know is what it is"

He winced "that would be the psycho and the buffout. The psycho gives you a hardcore adrenaline rush, and the buffout Dulls pain. Makes you stronger aswell. I needed to get back on my legs after the buckshot"

So that's why he was so strong, he was using rumble drugs. Never heard of one called psycho, our buffout though, but they sound damn nasty.

"which raises another question altogether, who shot you?"

"ah, raiders."

"raiders?"

"yeah, that's what I said."

"uh huh, and because you got shot in the leg you decided to draw your weapon and fire upon UNSC personnel. And only stopped fighting after a marine who heard the confrontation put 6 rounds in your chest"

"Well, when you say it like that..."

"did you know you had 17 slugs in you?"

"uh, no actually. I never counted"

"How have you managed to get yourself shot at least 17 times?"

"some people don't take criticism well."

"I see, how did you get aboard this ship."

"I was teleported aboard using the big mountain transponder, it's likely in the supply closet as well as the rest of my equipment"

"yes, we have that. Which brings us to this."

She slid a datapad forward to him with an image of his odd plasma pistol.

"What is this?"

She raised an eyebrow "That's your weapon, don't play dumb."

"no I mean, what's it on. What is this thing" he said, pointing at the data pad with a furrowed expression

that only seemed to add to her own confusion "it's a data pad, standard issue."

In a moment his disposition changed, keeping his furrowed expression. "yeah that's my plasma defender"

"where did you get it? Some covenant you innies managed to kill?"

"what? No, I got that from an old enclave base. What the hell's the covenant, or innies for that matter?"

He seemed, genuine. absolutely sincere.

What the hell is he tryin to do here?

he's gotta be an insurrectionist.

some kind of James Bond type they managed to cook up. An old hell jumper that turned, maybe.

But that still brings into question the plasma pistol, that's alien tech. We haven't even managed to start reverse engineerin plasma tech as far as I know, and yet he has a fully functionin model. Did the insurrectionists side with the covies? They declared total war us humans for offendin their gods, or somethin like that. But maybe some innies managed to convince them, or the covies are using them more likely.

"Alright, let's try this again. How did you get onboard?"

"I've told you already, I teleported aboard using my Big MT transponder."

a sigh is heard from the interrogator "who made the plasma pistol."

"One would assume the enclave"

"and they are?"

"Remnants of old America And they got some pretty serious tech. half of it, they made. Like my pretty gun, and even power armor. a special kind they made themselves, X0- something... never been a fan of power armor, but no one wants to fight a man in a set of it. much less that hardy enclave tech, and that's ignoring the energy weapons they always have"

"Energy weapons? What kind of energy weapons?" I could here the interrogator trying to douse her interest, a human group with energy weapons would be all hells of invaluable, already reverse engineered and ready to be mass produced. Damn near gives me a hard on just thinkin of it.

maybe some innie planet got glassed by covies, and survivors managed to reverse engineer the tech. Maybe a mining installation. about as far fetched as it comes, but possible I suppose. it'll explain how he got his tech.

And if they'd managed to manufacture a version of power armor with their limited resources... My god, now this could be invaluable. and there just might be a group of their faction on the planet below, would explain why the innies have caught so much steam here.

"well, plasma rifles, laser rifles, Gatling lasers, guess rifles, LAERs. Stuff like that, pretty much only the enclave, or the brotherhood.

multiple groups? Maybe some UNSC Patriots caused a civil conflict inside? He might not be an enemy. By what was that about laser rifles?

"I'm sorry, did you say laser rifles?"

She did read my mind

"Yup"

She cleared her voice "Like 'pew pew' science fiction, laser rifles?"

"Those would be the ones"

The interrogator turned to look at the one way glass, before looking back to him.

"I think I'm gonna take a little break"

"Mind bringing me some coffee?" he called out as she left

The interrogator didn't respond as she opened the door and stepped out, closing it.

"Well?"

"he's not lying" Galahands voice responded

"you serious?"

"He's not giving out any tell that I can see, he's either an exceptional liar or he's telling the truth"

"Laser weapons? Really?"

"At the very least he thinks he's telling the truth."

"That's impossible, insane."

"as insane as teleporting aboard the ship?"

"It doesn't make any sense!"

"they thought the same off faster than light travel"

"teleportin?" I vainly put out

Galahands voice rang out "I would have known had he gotten aboard when we set off, and I run occasional check-ups on the crew."

"human-made plasma weaponry then?"

"perhaps they managed to reverse engineer covenant weaponry"

"how?"

"sometimes people get lucky."

"Maybe, but the fact is that this guy has a man-made plasma pistol. If he's an enemy, we'll get rid of him, if not. We'll get some use out of him."


	3. Nerio

Planet "Nerio"

Date: 2531 May 28

Location: Suspected innie base

Lance-Corporal Duran

Moving into position alongside Abrams, Garcia, Wilson, and Parker, My fire team. Garcia and Parker are our sniping support, Abrams, Wilson and I are here to support them. That and to use our position on this dollar shop to relay any possible incoming reinforcements to Lieutenant White. ONI had gotten good intel that this was a major base of some innies, what they're doing at an old fire station is beyond me.

A man always prepares for a fight the same way, abrams taps his foot, Garcia cracks his knuckles. Me? I chew gum.

Various 'readies' signaling that the five fireteams are in position "Ready!"

The command to go is sent, doors are breached and various teams moved in, only for the crackling of gunfire to issue back. Secondary teams quick move in following the breaching forces. Apparently, there's supposed to be an underground base of operations, here. We're also supposed to retrieve information on any other Innie locations.

Crack, the sound of Garcia's heavy rifle taking a shot at some Innie who'd moved up onto the roof, it was pretty quiet for us after that, most of the fighting was happening inside.

Sporadic sounds of gunfire continue for a two minutes or so before the tone starts to change. The officer's channel is suddenly filled with reports of men down before cutting out entirely.

"Hello? This is Duran, anyone copy?" Silence…..

"Sergeant Doe, do you copy?" nothing still, "Lieutenant, do you copy?"

My men are looking at me, parker looks just about ready to shit himself. He only recently joined up, Wilson just has that same cool expression. He's been through to many units.

"This is Lance-Corporal Duran to the Magellan, I've lost contact with my platoon I believe it to be a trap"

No answer.

"Duran."

"What is it, Garcia?"

"The buildings on fire"

Looking back to the building I realized that indeed, it was on fire. Smoke was wavering into the sky, the fire wasn't visible but the smoke was.

"This is Lance-Corporal Duran to the Magellan please respond."

Fucking nothing, what do I do? What the hell do I do!`

"We need to get out of here." Abrams voiced

"We can't dessert the rest of the platoon!" Parker stabbed

"There's nothing we can do for them now!" Abrams shot back

"Sir there's a target on the roof" Garcia's voice cut through

I turned my focus back to the roof, it looked like a hell jumper if hell jumpers wore a thicker and heavier armor. it looked like he was looking at us.

"Shoot him!"

Garcia's rifle filled the air again. "I missed!" Parker's rifle replied this time I saw sparks as the bullet grazed off the shoulder piece of the hell bringer who was moving way too quickly.

I shouldered by rifle and began spraying bursts, none seemed to find their target before he leaped over the side

"Lieutenant, a tango with a flamethrower and heavy armor just dived off the roof. Do you copy?"

Silence yet again.

"Lieutenant?"

….

"Fuck this, we're getting out of here"

"But sir!"

"Stow it parker. Move to the ladder." parker seemed just about ready to refuse before finally giving and pulling his rifle up

Abram took up front as we moved to the ladder and began climbing done, I signaled Garcia next, then Wilson, parker, and finally me. "Move, I want out of this black zone."

I wave my men to follow me as I starting heading outside of town to avoid endangering the civvies.

I checked the com at regular intervals but it didn't get any better, and at 20 minutes in. it got worse, gunfire started to rain on our position, most of us managed to scramble to cover while slugs rained around us, most of us managed to scramble to cover, but parker. He took a round through the throat.

The crack of battle rifles rained on our position so ferociously that we couldn't move for the sake of our heads. I pulled a flashbang from my pouch and signaled to my men to look away, we don't have the fancy auto darkening huds like most special forces do, tossing the flash over my makeshift cover. An old 2520 suburban, "BOOK IT" the flash bang went off, and we stood up. Ears ringing, gunfire sprayed around us. Luckily none managed to hit me or my remaining men before we rounded a corner.

UNSC Carrier Magellan

Alexander

Who are these people? I wish I hadn't lost to ask my questions to the woman. But the guards just dragged me out after a while. didn't even get my fucking coffee, bitch. I saw the UNSC on their shoulder badges, so I knew their not enclave. Or brotherhood, maybe institute? But frankly I don't think any of them have the tech for space travel, but then again what do I know about what they develop. UNSC, UN. United nations maybe? Some old world attempt to survived the apocalypse? But her voice was distinctively new yorker, and they speak English. and why would the UN work together? They nuked each other after all.

Tap Tap Tap Tap

Rubber souls, those boots they all seem to wear. Guess my posse of guards is here escort me somewhere, wonder where. Not like I have a say in it one way or another. Standing, brushing myself off and combing my hair back with my hand. A man should be presentable. Even in this fancy orange jumpsuit, not sure why they bothered with the hideous orange. Pretty much anyone not wearing combat uniforms would stand out from what I've seen, and there's nowhere to escape to anyway. Finally, they get to my cell door and pull it open.

I'm already standing and waiting for em, hardly anything is said. They just nod for me to move forward, and then cuff my hands. Then gesturing me to move past them and let the behind the take lead, bringing me to wherever it is.

It didn't take long to arrive back in the stereotypical interrogation room from before, this time, however, it was empty. Oddly they sent me into the room without following me in this time, and proceed to close the door once I entered. Silence reigned for a while as I stood there before finally sitting down. About six minutes pass before a man in a differing and important looking uniform comes in and sits down across from me, as the guards from before taking a corner in the room each.

"Hello, Mr alexander." in a thick Texan accent. immediately following the voice appearance is a see-through image painfully familiar to the Sierra Madre casino's own holographs, this one appeared to be wearing some kind of Knights armor, not a brotherhood knight mind. "Hello. Mr?"

"beck, Captain beck."

"and whose the knight in holographic armor?"

The knight responded for itself "I am Galahand."

"to what do I owe the pleasure?"

The captain put forth his voice again "I'll be direct Mr alexander." he pulled a device I now know with a data pad, but instead of previous just showing my plasma pistol, in now showed the entirety of my gear. "I want to know what your equipment is, what it does. And if you dance around with it like have some far, I will be most unhappy. Which will result in my releasing my oni dogs that I've kept off you thus far."

"I see." Jesus, he went straight for my neck. I have no idea who oni is but the relation is clear. They wanna know how my gear works and if I don't tell them the easy way, they'll get out the hard way. "I'll need my pip boy"

"pip-boy?"

They don't know what a pip boy is? "the wrist mounted computer..Er thank you, I'll need it to explain the plasma and pulse grenades. Don't really take them apart all that often so I don't know how they work as well as my firearms"

"I see. Galahand, get someone to bring his pip-boy."

By the time I finished telling them about the objects they pointed out, the plasma defender, stim-packs, radaway, rad-x, etc. My pip-boy was brought to me. Then I got into the plasma and pulse grenades, no one seemed to be writing anything down. But I was probably being recorded, eventually, after a moment of silence reigned for a minute before the captain finally spoke: "you're not an insurrectionist are you?"

"what tipped you off sir?"

"most Innies would rather put a bullet in their head then give UNSC anything."

He seemed to study me for a moment before speaking once more.

"Mr alexander do you have any idea what a Shaw-Fujikawa Engine is?"

"I'm afraid not, sir."

He nodded. "Take him back to his cell for now."

"wait a moment sir."

"yes?"

"may I ask you a few questions myself."

A raised eyebrow, then a furrowed brow, and finally a light smile. "That's not normally how this works. But ask away Mr alexander."

"who are you? This group of people I mean?"


	4. Between a rock and an alien place

Wow, this one took a little while. been busy lately, plus a mild lack of motivation to get my lazy ass to work.

UNSC Carrier Magellan

Captain Beck

"What? Do You think Galahand?"

"I find his seeming lack of information unbelievable if I'm honest. And his stories is ludicrous, another earth? Although he does seem to believe it, which leaves me to wondering if his memories have been tampered with."

I raised an eyebrow "explain?"

"There are multiple devices inside his school, as well as him suffering physical damage to the brain, on top of that there's scarring around his skull that doesn't have a reason to be there, we can see where all the objects we're put in, and the scar for the tissue damage to his frontal lobe. as well as one in the center of his cranium for access to the removed portion of his brain. But this massive scar that circles his skull is an unknown"

"Damn, what they hell did they do to him?"

Silence reigned for a moment

"What off the engines?"

"No progress I'm afraid,

"you can't fix it?"

"I'm afraid so"

"and no response from command for our signal?"

"none"

"damn."

We're stuck on a planet with a major insurrectionist presence, and now I have this guy to deal with.

"Is what he said about those 'stempacks' true?"

"stimpacks sir, and yes. Testing on cloned genetic material revealed that it was able to produce an incredible healing factor, I also took the liberty of taking a look at these "power armor" schematics, and while I'm no engineers, the design seems to practice. Which brings me to my next point, something that may have incredible value to us"

"what's that?"

"his batteries, simple sounding really but upon investigating them properly, they are basically a mini fusion reactor."

"holy shit"

"holy shit indeed, they produce an incredible amount of power. You could run a data pad on one for a year without replacement or recharging, and those are just the fusion cells, these 'fusion cores' have the possibility to run a generator for two hundred years or more if his pip-boy is to be believed. And based on my testing, I believe it accurate. Which brings me to a bit of an issue, his energy weapons require at least one micro fusion cell to fire a single shot. It is likely why his 'earth' if he is to be believed, had these resource wars and eventually destroyed itself. Based off this, they consumed resources at a ridiculous rate"

"so what does this mean for the energy weapon?"

"most likely useless, it doesn't seem to perform much better than the MD6 side arm in testing. And if we were to field it to the common troops it would bankrupt the UNSC, on top of that. Its construction is alien. Even with him helping us I doubt we'd manage to make much use of them besides."

"So, useless then."

"Well, the gun is. but the energy source is frankly, invaluable sir. It produces a massive amount of energy that would likely be valuable to the war effort, and the stimpacks are of course even more invaluable, it long outperforms bio foam."

"Shit like that could save a lot of lives."

We fell into a comfortable silence for a while after that, it was nice to have something easy of the mind. Hopeful even. A couple minutes into my R&R I seem to be stealin midday Galahand piped up again.

"Sir, lieutenant white missed his check up."

"When?" back to business

"Just now sir."

"Try to get in touch with them."

"I am now sir."

Planet "Nerio"

Date: 2531 May 28

Location: Suspected innie base

Lance-Corporal Duran

These fuckers have been running us down all night, it's come to ahead in this fucking parking lot. We're pinned down like nothing else, occasionally I or Wilson dare to peek to send a burst or two out at em. but otherwise we're sitting ducks, can't even run to new cover, they're shredding the chevy I'm behind, and the ford Wilson's behind is fucking trashed, barley shredded metal left.

We long since cannibalized abrams machine gun for ammo, and Garcia ran out of rounds for his sniper a long time ago, we gave them our sidearm ammo and have them reloading our magazines. Abram's with me, Garcia's with Wilson. We won't be able to survive much longer, but our check in should have been a couple minutes ago. Hopefully, the Magellan figures out what's going on and sends reinforcements. But I'm not very hopeful. Galahand's a solid AI but someone reporting late does happen, And he's not the type to worry.

Of course, as I start saying that my radio starts to buzz out, like someone trying to connect but just out of range. I grab it quickly shouting into it "This is Lance-Corporal Duran, we need reinforcements on our position ASAP, RIGHT FUCKING NOW GOD DAMMIT."

No answer, I just have to hope they caught it. "You think they heard us?" Abram's, I've never seen him look so small. "Yeah I think so" I take a deep breath and peek my cover, before being forced back under by a hail of gunfire.

I glance at the side mirror of the car, now tilted at a degree so that I can see them approaching.

They're starting to move on us, three in total. They'll be on top of us in no- A painful screeching cuts through the cacophony and just as quickly it ended with a clash as satan himself brought his fist down on one of the insurrectionists moving on our position; an ODST pod. In a flash, the door burst open at twenty miles an hour nailing another, and out stepped a fucking spartan, the numbers '104' painted into his torso. Faster than I could keep track with he put two rounds into the third and final insurrectionist before seeming to stop for a moment, a dead silence fell upon the once screaming battlefield. Both sides were shocked, but could you blame them? This was a spartan, the fuckers the can crash an elites windpipe with a bitch slap, flip tanks, and hit a speck of a covenant carrier from planet side. If the stories are to be believed that is. Exaggerates stories or no, there impressive nonetheless. It wasn't long before insurrectionists starting shooting again, oddly they left us alone this time, focus firing on the seven foot tall of metal and fucking death that just obliterated three of em. But I wasn't going to get left out of the fun. "Hey, Boys! Let's give our reinforcements a warm welcome by helping kill these sons of bitches!" I learned that line out of an old war movie. call me corny but the corny shit works, Otherwise it wouldn't be corny. It seemed to get my men in a stir because before long all of us we're up and giving covering fire, me and Wilson with our battle rifles, Garcia, and abrams with their sidearms. Mine two in the case of abrams, dueling them like he's in some sort of video game. Ever had three MD6's and a couple BR55's open up on you like they don't know what ammo conservation is? I can safely say we gave adequate covering fire, not like he needed it. But we got a couple in the shit load of lead we were sending their way. Quick as a flash he leaped over a sports car and bit two rounds in whoever or whatever was behind it. Then followed it up by putting a trio of rounds into a someone I couldn't quite see, he leaped back over the car's roof and fell to his knees and bullets sprayed into it. By this time abrams and Garcia had run out of ammo and we're taking cover while I and Wilson started burst firing. Which was quickly punished and gunfire started to fall on us forcing us under with the guys, I locked my eyes on the mirror as I watched the spartan through it pull a pin on his grenade and chuck it over the side of the car. I held my breath and waited for it to blow, once it did I pulled up from my cover again and started to fire in three round bursts. Meanwhile, he charged from cover directly at them. But they were dazed and disorganized. Hardly any even peeked from their cover behind their car's to shoot at him, the few that did get a three round burst in their chests and heads from yours truly or Wilson. It wasn't long before he was on top of them and was going full auto with his MA37. it was over quick, the whole confrontation took all of fifteen seconds. Those fuckers had chased us all night long and one spartan ended in fifteen seconds. He stood up and looked around, quickly scanning the area at a full three hundred and sixty degrees. Seeming to decide the area was clear he moved up to us, he stood before us as we left our cover.

"Thanks for the backup, sir." I didn't know what rank he was, but I think it's safe to assume a spartan outranked me. He nodded before simply stating. "A pelicans in route to us to pick you up."

"Just us sir?"

"Just you."

I guess he got other things to do planetside, makes sense. I doubt they'd send a fucking spartan to help a couple soldiers. That whole silent spartan thing was really proving to be accurate as well. We buckled down waiting for pickup while the spartan seemed to wander around. Interestingly enough comms still aren't going through. Either way, after waiting about ten minutes we could see the pelican approaching. Birds were damn fast, clocking out at 900 kilometers an hour if memory serves. It wasn't much longer before it was landing in front of us, we huddled aboard before turning to watch the spartan watch us. Taking off and the loading bay closing as we strapped ourselves in as it took off. We made it.

UNSC Carrier Magellan

Alexander

He filled me in on a lot of what was going on, but they also gave me a datapad so I could answer some of my questions myself. This is ridiculous, Aliens? I mean sure, I've seen them before. But this covenant? Where the hell are the zetas? Is it 2530ish? Am I 300 years in the future of a totally different universe? It's like something those brains in a jar at Big MT would think up. And test it by shooting rockets with dogs in them into space. There computing tech is ridiculous, and they have AI so complicated it makes the best ZAX supercomputer look like a hand held calculator. Why didn't they have the resource wars? Based on the history I'm getting from this thing it's not like they were much friendlier with each other. There had even been a handful of nuclear exchanges. But none anywhere near the great war in scope, it was depressing. According to this, there are twenty-nine 'garden worlds', ready to be inhabited with little to no terraforming, naturally producing an ecosystem and a breathable atmosphere. Twenty-nine planets. And you think that's bad? Oh boy, we're just getting started, they're seven hundred and seventy-two colonies on non-naturally habitable planets, asteroids, and moons. The works. They colonized mars in 2080, three years after my world nuked itself. Their census of the population states forty billion people, that made the NCR's strong two million look like an ant as to an elephant. It made me feel small. I couldn't find any results for energy weapons that wasn't a movie, book, or video game. That's when I started having fun, I delved into whatever medical information I could find as a start, I wanted to know about weapons firstly but I didn't know if they were watching me and if they would take the datapad if I delved into that side of their world, I stuck with medicine at first, they were impressive. The average human lifespan has been increased by roughly twenty years due to medical advancements, they're working on refining cloning as well, information was vague but it was clear they were using the cloned body parts to replace lost ones, primary organs. From what I could find they didn't seem quite on par with vault tec's cloning experiments, but they didn't to have any with swelling in the limbic system of the brain. Causing aggression and extreme xenophobic behavior to anyone who wasn't one of the clones. As evidenced in vault 108. Wish I brought the think tank with me, I'm smart but they're smarter, if a bit crazy. Having them around to digest this with would be nice, and the aide's we managed to get to the big MT by expanding the transponders area of effect. Particularly, Brayton, he's a hell of an engineer and might be able to make heads out of this Shaw-Fujikawa Translight Engine. I certainly can't, I get the biological stuff as a slightly overqualified doctor. The mechanical crap is above my pay grade beyond how to keep my guns working.

Apparently, they'd also managed some 'cybernetic' implants, making their soldiers faster and stronger. It seemed most of not everyone was mildly engineered to be 'better' mostly for the sake of more comfortable living on other planets. I'm not sure how I felt about that. but with all the crap that's in me, I'm not one to judge. Speaking of I couldn't find any records of anything on par with my own, though I found some very vague details about a group known as ODST's or 'helljumpers'. Apparently, they dropped from low orbit in a capsule of sorts, hardcore guys. Like NCR Rangers on buffout. Apparently, they had some kind of modifications made them, but I wasn't sure how extensive they were, and of these feats were one of training or prowess. I also read stories about 'spartans'. But they were clearly myths, the accounts for them were most likely myths. Who they were and what they were was vague, and I couldn't find as an offical site that listed them among the military. About now is when I got into military rankings. But I didn't get far before klaxons started ringing and Galahands voice rang out

"All personnel to battle stations, this is not a drill."

UNSC Carrier Magellan

Captain Beck

"What of Lieutenant White's platoon?"

"massacred sir, only four survivors."

"christ almighty, an ambush?"

"It appears so."

Terrible, that's thirty-two men down.

"how'd we get bad intel on this?"

"I don't know sir."

"I outta bring hell on this ONI team's heads for this…. Dammit, what about our guest?"

"he appears to be exploring the datapad, mostly medical information at the moment"

"huh, Is he a doctor by any chance?"

"Maybe, although he's switching between population counts and medical information at the moment."

"continue to keep an eye on him, tell me if you see anything weird."

"of course sir."

I went back to work looking over the reports of the various other platoons who made work planetside, most faired well. Hardly any casualties. And spartan 104 made good on his report to take retrieve the stolen military tech. Spartans 051 and Spartan 087 had reported success on their mission as well. I didn't relish splitting their team but there's only so many Spartans to go around.

"Sir! Trouble"

"what is it?"

"A covenant scout ship has just slipstreamed into the system!"

"what? Send an alert!" I rushed from my quarters the bridge while klaxons started to blaze a and Galahand sent out the alert, convenient? What were they doing here? We don't have the numbers to fight off any kinda force with just the Magellan, hell we wouldn't have the force to fight off just one of their ship. Not with that three to one ratio required to guarantee a destroy one of their ships

"Galahand! Is it in range?"

"No sir!"

"We have to take it out before it brings a whole armada on our ass, get us in range now!"

"Yes, sir!"

I arrived on the deck, I couldn't do much till we were closer, we were running full steam at a covenant ship. sure it's a scout ship but even with our size advantage over it, we're just a carrier. We don't have the shielding that thing has.

"Ready the cannon!"

"Already on it captain!" tucker, it's his job to do just that.

"Fire as soon as you can, if that thing gets away we're done for."

At this point, the scout ship seemed to choose to flee over fighting and the telltale signs a slipstream opening, like a whirlpool opening in space.

Tucker's voice rang out "Firing main cannon!" The Magnetic Accelerator Cannon, or the MAC cannon. A coil gun. A standard frigate-mounted MAC averages at 185 meters, It can fire a 600-ton ferric-tungsten projectile with a depleted uranium core at 30,000 meters per second and takes several minutes to recharge to full capacity between shots. The issue with it is that while 30,000 meters is very fast relative, it's not so fast when the vastness of space is between you and your target. Tucker did good firing as soon as we could, the ship will be god knows where in roughly ten seconds. But the chances of it disabling them as slow as it's going is low, much less destroying them outright. Top that off with whatever shielding they have, I'm not hopeful. It's a long wait as the slug travels through the space between our ships. The slipstream has opened by now at they're just starting to move in, but not before our shot catches the tail end of their ship. Immediately following it the ship disappears into the slipstream.

We all know what this means, they escaped. We'll have a battle group on our asses within twenty-four hours most likely.

"Get us back into an orbit around the planet."

"Yes captain"

I sat down in the chair, frustrated. We had no way of escape. Not with the engines broken. The crew didn't know the engines weren't functioning. Just the bridge crew plus alexander. "Galahand, open a ship-wide comm."

"yes, sir."

I took a deep breath, and let it out slowly

"Ready when you are, captain."

I nodded. "this is Captain Beck to all personnel. Approximately twenty-eight hours ago we came out of slip space able this planet. I'm sure you those who weren't in cryo felt the unusual tremors as we came out of it, that was are slipstream engine malfunctioning. We don't know what the problem is exactly, but it's offline."

I let that sit for a moment, before following it with three worse news. "as you know we are at our battle stations presently, to those that may not know a covenant scouting vessel appeared within the system close to the planet and consequently us. We came here to squash an insurrectionist uprising that's been brewing on Nerio, but it seems likely we'll be defending it from a covenant assault." I just effectively told my crew that we were doomed. Everyone knew about the estimated one to three ratio for UNSC to covenant ships. And we were a carrier, not a battleship. Supposing a small battle group of seven showed up we'd be a lost cause, more than that? The average fifteen? Hell. It's hard to know when they'll show up, slipstream travel can take a while over the right distance. But the covenant is much faster than us, either way, reinforcements won't reach us in time. Maybe a single ship once they receive our message to tow us out of here. But even if they beat the covenant here it'll leave the planet defenses, they're two hundred thousand people on the planet below and not a single defense. Not even a single orbital platform. It's a relatively new but a major mining colony. We can't defend it alone and we can't run. And the planet apparently has much larger sympathies to the insurrectionists than expected based on reports from the two platoons we sent surface side. 'trapped between a rock and a hard place'.

"Galahand get anyone you can working on the engine, and get the naval officers to the conference room. We'll need to talk strategy."

"Yes, sir."


End file.
